Chapter 2: Orientation Week

On Friday the 8th of August I arrived in Singapore. Immediately after I arrived at the airport I got a very warm welcome from the houseparents Chris and Terry and some other people from UWC. We took a taxi to the College.

My first thought when I got out of the taxi was just “Oh man, this is getting real! “ - Seconds later I stood in my room looking over the huge football field and the rest of the campus, in the far back you can see the skyline of Singapore. To this day I believe that I will never adapt to that view.

I started to meet the other boarders, and of course my roommate Rakeb from Ethiopia. She really is one of the happiest and lovable people I have ever met.

Later that evening we had our first session where I met everyone and we got introduced.

The next days were full of orientation sessions. We got to know how life works in a community, especially in the Boarding House, called Tampines House. We got to know all the officials that we need to know and everybody else around the Tampines House who is important. UWC Values were a big topic of the sessions, we learned about UWC and the movement. We talked about our purpose here and what we personally want to achieve.

We visited Tampines town on the second day, Tampines is the little down the Campus is located. With little I mean several community centres, three huge Malls that are open 24/7 and many many tall residential buildings. It was really nice to get to know the area a little bit more, and I discovered Bubble Tea, which is not going to be my new addiction to say it nicely.

We had an amazing pool party at the swimming pool and some CommuniTEA, where we just sit on the 6th floor between 9-10pm every night and chat or play cards.

We visited the Island Santosa, where we had some group building activities. One of them was climbing up a 24m high metal structure with a lot of hard challenges on the way.

Right under the UWC value of challenging yourself I managed to at go at least the first round, but only with a lot of crying and help from my new friend Jack, who was really patient with me.

A lot of us were facing our fears and challenging ourself that day, it was an awesome experience. But we could not leave that day behind without screaming Bohemian Rhapsody in the back of a taxi with 9 people. Those memories are worth keeping as well.

The orientation week ended with an amazing trip to downtown Singapore. We went into the Gardens By The Bay and watched a beautiful light show on the huge Mangrove trees. After that we went underneath the Marina Bay Sands Hotel to the other side. The view of the skyline of Singapore is just breathtaking. It was the first moment in which I actually realised that I was here, that I finally made it to Singapore.

We watched another light show in the Bay and walked through the shopping mall underneath the hotel with all the really affordable clothing boutiques.

I made some amazing friendships in only these few days and I have to say that I might have left my family at home but I found a new one here in Singapore. Although everybody, and yes also me, is dealing with homesickness we are all here to help each other and the strength of this community surprises me every time.

The orientation week ended and the official part began. We got our laptop together with several IT sessions, our principle welcomed us and we got a tour through the campus. The english and math test were done and more sessions regarding our school start on Monday happened.

I’m really looking forward to the school start, I slightly get around the campus by myself although our Seniors promised us that we will get lost in the first weeks. But the school is providing Mentors for us that we meet every morning, we got school and boarding buddies and a lot of nice people we can reach out for so I’m confident that everything will sort itself out.